A Shooting Star
by Ellis Jenkins
Summary: Sam Green is one of the evacuees from the Earth colony on Gammatron. She also has Autism Spectrum Disorder. Most of the people around her don't understand her. But Data seems to. This is the story of the friendship between a girl who sees the universe differently and an android man desperately trying to fit in.


I sit in Ten-Forward, eating a sausage on my plate and taking a sip of my drink after every two bites. Everyone back on Gammatron thought it was strange, how I work around the plate, eating one thing and then another. Here, on the Enterprise, nobody even notices. Except, maybe the bartender, but she doesn't say anything if she does. At one of the rare moments I look up, I see someone in a blue medical/science uniform coming towards me. Immediately, I look down at my plate again. I don't know this person. I tell myself to breathe.

"Hello," a modulated voice says. "Can I sit?"

She's probably going to anyway, so I shrug.

"So, you're Samantha?" she asks; she knows I am, so why bother asking?

"Sam." I instantly, quietly correct her.

"Of course," she replies, smiling. "I'm the ship's counsellor, Deanna Troi."

Of course she's a counsellor. Even in the 24th century, people hear Autism or Autistic and think 'She needs help; get a counsellor or a therapist or something'. Add on the fact that most of the people on Gammatron, the planet I lived on for only two years, had to be evacuated, and it's pretty definite that I'm going to be given unwelcome help.

I'm trying really hard to concentrate on eating. It's disconcerting, having someone I don't know watch me eat, probably analysing everything I do.

"Do you mind me asking a few questions?" counsellor Troi asks.

 _Yes,_ I think, but I shake my head.

"Do you always eat that way?"

I nod.

"It's wrong to eat any other way." I tell her.

"Why do you think that?"

"If I start something, I need to finish it," I explain. "I can't just stop eating the sausages and eat three potatoes and then finish the sausages. I have to finish eating all the sausages before starting on the potatoes."

Finally, I looked up at Deanna Troi. I think she's Betazoid - she has the black irises.

"Do you have any other habits with eating?" she asks.

"I eat a lot of things in ways that probably seem strange to people," I answer. "I can't eat sandwiches the way other people do. I have to take the filling out and eat it separately to the bread. I only eat pepperoni pizza, and I have to eat the pepperoni, then the cheese and then the base. I have a lot of other ways I eat different things, but the pattern is that I can't eat two different things at the same time."

"That's interesting." Troi comments.

I wait for her to say something else, but the chirp of her badge and a voice saying, "Counsellor Troi to the bridge," stops her from speaking.

"I'll see you soon." Tori tells me, before leaving.

I look down at my plate - all that's left is the potatoes. I smile to myself and stab my fork into one, looking around as I bite into it. I think I could get used to life on the Enterprise.

* * *

I'm sitting in an armchair in the corner of the quarters Captain Picard assigned to me and stroking the armrests. In the background, I have one of Captain Kirk's logs playing, quietly. I've always loved learning about the Starfleet careers of him and the crew he commanded on the Enterprise and the Enterprise-A. They're so inspirational! My dad was a worker in the Historical Starfleet Records, and he managed to get me copies of all of the official and personal logs of the senior staff, and the day he gave them to me I was ecstatic. These recordings are the only things that really matter to me now. When the door chimes, I'm startled. I panic slightly.

"Who is it?" I manage to ask.

"It's Captain Picard." the English accent replies, and I smile.

I pause the log and stand up.

"Come in." I say.

The captain walks in. Patiently, I wait for him to say something.

"I was on my way to my quarters and thought I'd check up on you." Picard tells me.

I nod, and wait for him to say something else.

"Are you settling in well?" he asks.

I nod again.

"I assume Counsellor Troi spoke to you today."

Another nod.

"How was that?"

"She's better than other counsellors and therapists I've had," I reply. "She seemed perfectly happy with my answers about how I eat, rather than just think I was strange."

I smile a little bit. Picard smiles back.

"I'm glad you're settling in." he says, before leaving me.

* * *

A/N:

This note is just to say hi, and to ask that there isn't any flame in your review, if you do review.

Thanks!

Ellis Jenkins


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